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Cooking gas shortage puts a damper on New Year celebrations
Long queue for gas in Puttalam. Pic by Hiran Priyankara
As 2022 dawned yesterday, the cooking gas crisis was a damper on celebrations with many households not being able to cook even the traditional ‘kiribath’ for the festive table.
In the past few weeks, people standing in winding queues stretching over a kilometre to buy gas has been a common sight. Long queues were seen also at fuel sheds to buy kerosene. Some were looking for firewood.
In the wee hours of the mornings, people lined up outside dealers’ outlets to grab a cylinder of gas. But many went empty-handed because the dealers were supplied only a limited number of cylinders which were snatched up no sooner they arrived.
In some places, dealers distributed tokens to manage the crowd. Those who were unlucky, went home carrying their empty cylinders and expressing their frustration and anger at the government.
The two gas companies said various conditions imposed to ensure safety and maintain the quality of the gas were slowing down the supply.
They said their workload had increased as they had to check the valves of cylinders and replace them if they were defective. The quality of gas needed to be checked and approved by the Consumer Affairs Authority (CAA) and the Sri Lanka Standards Institution (SLSI).
These measures follow a court order and recommendations made in the report of the presidential committee which probed the series of gas cylinder explosions.
In demand: Kerosene stoves. Pic by Akila Jayawardana
The committee has directed the SLSI, the CAA, the ITI (Industrial Technology Institute) and the SLAB (Sri Lanka Accreditation Board) to ensure the implementation of the fresh recommendations.
These include checks on safety standards of the cylinder valve and the display of embossed stickers indicating the percentage components of propane, butane and concentration of the odorant ethyl mercapton.
ITI Secretary Jayantha de Silva said the propane composition should be maintained below 30 percent with ethyl mercaptan odorant concentration at 14.
The recommendations also called for maintaining standards on regulators, valves, the connecting hose and the stove itself.
With cooking gas in short supply, traders made hay, jacking up the prices of electric cookers, kerosene cookers and hot plates.
The price of newly introduced induction cookers which were sold at Rs 12,000 about fortnight ago shot up to Rs. 20,000. Those who managed to buy these cookers also had to spend huge sums on special utensils meant for them.
Some households retrieved discarded kerosene cookers from their junk rooms while clay hearths became handy with people turning to kerosene and firewood for cooking.
Due to the high demand, kerosene and firewood also went scarce. Many who joined long queues to buy kerosene were disappointed because before their turn came, the stocks had been sold out.
Firewood was a luxury with supermarkets also selling it. A small bundle of firewood is sold at Rs. 250. Scarcity of kerosene prompted some housewives to use shopping bags to light up their hearth.
Those who live in high rise apartment, where the use of firewood for cooking is not allowed, said they mostly ate out or ordered food from restaurants.
“It is too expensive. I don’t know how long we can do this,” one housewife lamented. 
To cap it all, in a desperate move, a group of men waylaid a lorry carrying cylinders of cooking gas and got away with three cylinders. This happened on Thursday in Colombo 7.
Litro Gas, which accounts for some 80 percent of the market share, said it was working 24/7 to meet the consumer demand.
However due to red tapes and checks on the standards of the gas imported, the supply process had been slowed down, it said in a statement, adding that it would soon meet the country’s daily demand.
Meanwhile, gas cylinder explosions continued with at least two incidents being reported daily. On Friday, gas blasts were reported from two houses in Puttalam and Hunupitiya, Wattala.
The continuing explosions, prompted Civil Activist Nagananda Kodituwakku to once again file a motion in the Court of Appeal this week, complaining that the CAA and the gas companies had failed to act on the court’s order to recall the unsafe cylinders previously distributed to households.
The order came in pursuant of an earlier petition filed by Mr. Kodituwakku.
He pointed out that the gas already distributed to the market was the cause for the continuing explosions. 
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